Altium Designer is PCB design software for a variety of industries.
$355
per month per seat
AutoCAD
Score 8.7 out of 10
N/A
AutoCAD is a CAD product from Autodesk. It allows designers to work in 2D and 3D, and is available on Windows and Mac, but with extensive online collaboration tools.
$245
per month
Pricing
Altium Designer
AutoCAD
Editions & Modules
Standard - Monthly
$355
per month per seat
Pro - Monthly
$460
per month per seat
Standard - Single Payment
$4,235
one-time fee per seat
Pro - Single Payment
$5,495
per year per seat
Enterprise
Contact Sales
Monthly Subscription
$245
per month per user
Yearly Subscription
$1975
per year per user
3-Year Subscription
$5925
3 years per user
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Altium Designer
AutoCAD
Free Trial
Yes
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
No
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
Altium Designer® term-based licensing allows use of the licensed software for a specified period, for example, a 12-month term. Term-based licenses include a Standard subscription for the latest Altium Designer, and Altium 365®.
Additional features and license options will affect price.
Altium Designer is far easier to use and has a simplified pricing model for use to forecast project costs. Altium Designer also has many value-added features such as Altium 365 and MCAD integration which we can use for no additional costs. Other vendors charge by feature. …
I prefer Altium Designer because it makes collaboration easy, and I have had a more enjoyable time using it. Altium Designer runs better on my computer than other software, and I have never run into a problem while using it. It allows me to really get into my work and focus on …
It is possible to draw excellent-looking schematic diagrams in any personal style and transfer these to the PCB editor without problems. The library editors are quite easy to use, and as there are many available STEP models for the majority of components, 3D views are also easy to generate. The built-in 3D editor is, however fairly limited and even when fully mastered can only produce rudimentary images.
AutoCAD is great for large-scale printing, simple drawing, and manipulating exports from Revit to understand coordinate systems. We often use AutoCAD to create overlays that we then take into Navisworks. Understanding AutoCAD is crucial when working with subcontractor models. I have subs who only work in AutoCAD and I use it to make sure their models will work in my process.
Incredible integration between teams. I love using Altium 365 and how I can view, edit, and comment on my team members designs. It is an incredible platform and makes collaborations very easy.
Makes it easy to move between different projects, either local or public. I love how I can move between the PCB and schematics of different projects with no downtime.
The UI is clean and works well once someone has learned how to use it. Everything makes sense and the integrated shortcuts make it particularly simple and nice to work with.
I really love how I can search for any part in Altium Designer. I can source any part and place it exactly onto my PCB, allowing me to use the 3D model feature to see precisely what my designs will look like in real life.
The tools are easy to use and the learning curve is fairly minimal to be able to create blueprints.
The 3D application is very fun to use and it is nice to be able to see your product instead of having to imagine what it will look like.
The speed and accuracy in which students can create plans is a huge bonus. Students can plan their industrial art projects out and use their own set of plans to build them.
User Interface Customisation: AutoCAD's user interface could benefit from more robust customisation options. Allowing users to rearrange toolbars, menus, and panels according to their specific workflows and preferences would enhance productivity.
Enhanced 3D Modeling Tools: While AutoCAD is capable of 3D modeling, it's not as intuitive or feature-rich as dedicated 3D modeling software. Streamlining the process and adding more advanced modeling tools would be a welcome improvement.
Enhanced Collaboration and Version Control: AutoCAD could improve its collaboration tools, such as real-time editing and version tracking, to facilitate smoother teamwork, especially in multi-disciplinary projects.
Intelligent Object Libraries: AutoCAD could benefit from an expanded and more intelligent library of standard objects and components. This would save time for designers who often have to create custom components from scratch.
ALTIUM DESIGNER is the reference tool in the electronic circuit design sector, its use is widespread worldwide. Although there are other alternatives, some of them free do not rival ALTIUM DESIGNER in terms of features and reliability. It is also very practical to request quotes with ALTIUM DESIGNER BOM reports since all suppliers are accustomed to using the tool.
Because rarely we [would] rather wait for a whole year to update, sometimes the new updates don't bring many new features and we are still ok with the current version. Also the change of interface is always something that takes time for every partner in the company to get comfortable with. So those are the main reasons we may want to keep the same version.
Altium Designer is, by far, the easiest to use ECAD program in existence - and we’ve used a lot (OrCAD, PADS, Xpedition, EAGLE, etc.). Altium Designer has a very intuitive user interface and easy to understand and navigate. Even our project management team, who may not have technical backgrounds, can use Altium Viewer for the purposes of reviewing and handoff to our customers.
The use case of AutoCAD as a CAD software is highly relevant today as it focuses or targets to tasks types which involve creating 2D drawings of a number of types like electrical drawings, hydraulic drawings, layout diagrams, floor plans, etc. thereby addressing a large number of industries like Mechanical Engineering, Civil Engineering, Electrical Engineering and in most case Architectural Engineering as well
I use the educational Program. And so far is the best technical support. Every time that I need one or I have a question. They respond so far and with excellent advice.
AutoCAD has the issue of crashing or slowing down the design procedure once a heavy design that includes several disciplines or multiple families/blocks is involved. Customer services gets the feedback from the crash reports but this issue seems like it has never been addressed in the software updates past several years.
the implementation was realy easy , to set up our workstation we pay for the licenses we are about to use , there was a little bit of delay to get the payment processed to receive the serial but after that the install runs without any problem , so you can fell secure there will be not issue with the implementation.
It is certainly easier to get designs up and running with great support and constant software updates. The ability to work with or without the cloud is a great feature. The only downside to Altium Designer is that it does have a cost to it that is not cheap. Overall I think it is worth the investment.
I have experience with Autodesk Maya, and am familiar with their user interface with creating 3D objects. AutoCAD while from the same family, requires a steeper learning curve and more in-depth knowledge of the software.
I have experience with this software because it is the industry standard in the jobs that I applied to, and was required to the company that I interviewed for. Part of the interview process was a proof-of-work test to create a mock solution for a client, which would demonstrate knowledge and skill with using AutoCAD.
I have little experience with CorelCAD, but I found AutoCAD to be more in-depth with your options and what you could create.
Without a doubt, Altium Designer is a highly productive tool, which serves our company very well.
We find the pricing structure at Altium Designer to be abhorrent. We are continually sent reminders telling us about price increases on an already expensive product. When looking at the markets, it can be seen that Altium is already an extremely wealthy company. We "only" have 3 licenses, and if we wish to retain a subscription, we must pay for three, at a cost of around 3,000 dollars each, just receive small updates and faster (in theory, but not always in practice) support.
Altium has stopped offering upgrades. If we have purchased an older version (we have 2 licenses for earlier versions), Altium will not let us upgrade these for a reduced price but only sell new licenses. This practice was only introduced by Altium a few years ago, and we believe this to be a sign of an unethical company that is mainly interested in revenue and not the customer's pocket.
AutoCAD has helped our smaller firm produce lots of finished products matching that of a much larger size firm. With its many features, we have been able to do so much more and meet deadlines that much faster.
Since we do use AutoCAD, we're able to work with many other engineering firms to collaborate together to complete various building projects.
We have many clients now who expect us to provide for them at the end of a project not just printed construction drawings but also the digital AutoCAD drawing so they can in turn use it for future modifications themselves.
